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“Your problem is, you ain’t picked out some nice lady. Look at all these people here. They’re happy, see? They all got somebody. You don’t got nobody. If you had a nice girl to go home to, you wouldn’t have got caught with your pants off by that nastyputtanella,eh?”
“Zia, now’s not the time for the family values lecture,” Bruno said.
Zia Rosa waved him down. “Shhh. Like my old nonna back in Brancaleone used to say,” she intoned. “Attent’ a le fosse.”
Lily leaned over to Bruno. “What does that mean?”
Bruno sighed, and translated. “Beware of the holes.”
Aaro buried his face in his hands. “Tell me about it,” he muttered.
Zia Rosa patted Aaro’s thigh again, palpating his quadriceps muscle appreciatively. “The time’s come, I guess,” she announced, her voice heavy. “We oughtta have a talk with those Ranieri cousins.”
“Ranieri cousins?” Lily said. “Which cousins are those?”
“They’re second cousins, actually. We got the samebis-nonni. One of the big crime families in Jersey. Don Gaetano’s papa was a mafia don back in Calabria. Tony, Bruno’s uncle, he was Don Gaetano’s right-hand man, back in the day. But Tony didn’t like the life. He ran off.”
Lily waited for more. Zia Rosa just looked at her expectantly.
“Well, um…what do these other Ranieris in Jersey have to do with me?” she asked. “I don’t know them.”
Zia Rosa shrugged. “They sure as hell knew Magda.”
* * *
Bruno shotup off the couch. “What the fuck are you saying? It was Rudy who worked for the Ranieris! Not Mamma!”
“Don’t you use them dirtyparolacciewith me,stronzetto,” Zia Rosa scolded. “Be respectful. I’m guessin’ it’s time to send Tony’s letter. Them dirty sonzabitches broke the bargain. And they are goin’ down.”
Her words dropped into a pool of absolute silence. The room suddenly felt like it got smaller as everyone shifted forward in their seats, craning their necks to stare at the older woman.
“What bargain, Zia?” Bruno’s voice was tight.
She shrugged. “The letter Tony sent to Michael Ranieri, years ago. Tony chopped the fingers offa them mobster thugs who come after you, remember? He wrapped the letter around ‘em, and sent ‘em to Michael.”
Bruno felt his voice coming from far away. “I remember mobster thugs. I didn’t know anything about chopped fingers. Or a letter.”
“I guess not. Tony didn’t talk about stuff like that. But he had to tell me, so I’d know who to send the letter to if they whacked him.”
Everyone was perched on the edge of the cushions, except for Liv who was still nursing her baby. Even Sean had jolted bolt upright.
“Tell us about the letter, Zia,” Davy encouraged.
She fluttered plump, beringed hands. “Ah, well. Tony knew where a lot of bodies were buried. The hows, and the wheres, and where the money went. He dug some of them holes himself, see. You know how it is.” She glanced around the room. “Well. Maybe you don’t.”
“I do,” said Aaro darkly.
Zia Rosa patted his thigh again. “He wrote it all down,” she went on. “And the deal was, if them Raniericoglioniwhacked Tony, or tried to come after you again, I sent the letters out. To the press, to the prosecuting attorneys, the DA in Newark, the current DA, too.” She cackled. “Those guys’d come in their pants if they read Tony’s letter.”
“You never sent it?” Connor said. “You still have it?”
“So far. Tony told Michael that he’d left the copies with a lawyer, who was supposed to mail ‘em out if Tony died. But Tony didn’t trust no lawyers. He kept ‘em in a safe deposit box. I was supposed to send ‘em, if anything happened. But when something finally did…” She shrugged, her face sagging with sorrow. “It didn’t have nothin’ to do with the Ranieris. I figured it was over. But I guess it ain’t over.” Zia Rosa dug a tissue out of her purse and blew her nose into it, sniffing.
“Where’s the safe deposit box, Zia?” Connor asked gently.
She dabbed her eyes. “Eh? Oh, there ain’t no safe deposit box no more. I took it out after Tony died. I figured, if they was gonna make a move on Bruno, it would be when Tony kicked the bucket. I didn’t want to have to worry about no stupid banking hours.”
“So?” Val was prompting her now. His face, resting on Tam’s shoulder, was keen with interest. “Where is the letter?”
